"8 Mile Backup" ?

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Originally posted by ronin718
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Originally posted by msticaries
[br]Okay it makes sense to have to have the violator in the lanes before they can ticket, BUT how many exits from HOV are there between Dumfries and DC? three? four? so why not wait for them on the exit ramps. If they are exiting they have been in the lanes. :)

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Because if they wait to do the busting at the off-ramps, all of you who complain about the backups from enforcement/no enforcement down south will complain about being backed up at the off-ramps. The boys in blue can't win!!!

My suggestion... If you think you can do a better job enforcing the HOV, quit your current job, earn the badge, and put your plan in action. In the meantime, be grateful for the enforcement. You guys say there isn't enough of it as is.

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I rarely complain about enforcement. When they have done them in the past traffic was nowhere near this messed up. And yes I have sat on the merge lane at the END of the HOV while they were doing enforcement and it hasn't bothered me one bit.

I think our guys in blue do have a tough job, but all those officers this morning was a bit OVERKILL.

Read the WTOP article. It makes an excellent point - you cannot do enforcement on the on ramps because violators are only in violation once they reach the highway itself. It is not illegal for them to be on the on ramps.

Well for what its worth, I just sent my 2 cents off via email to the State Troopers. Hopefully if enough people complain, they may not do this again and will go back to just waiting at the on-ramps or come up w/ some other solution that hopefully won't stop traffic dead in its place.

Okay it makes sense to have to have the violator in the lanes before they can ticket, BUT how many exits from HOV are there between Dumfries and DC? three? four? so why not wait for them on the exit ramps. If they are exiting they have been in the lanes. :)

When we got on HOV this morning, the Potomac Mills onramp was backed up, just sitting still. I was 30 min late to work this morning. I was told that they brought the lanes down to single file at Newington with 15 officers on the ground - that is what WTOP reported. They said they were there for 1.5 hours. Once traffic got backed up, they left. I don't see what was wrong w/ having officers at the onramps. That seemed effective to me. Having them at only one place to catch people from further south seems distracting and of course causes back ups from people stopping/slowing and just plain ole' nosey people slowing down to take a look. The guy I rode in with this morning put in a call to the state police and they said they will be doing this more often and we are all lucky they didn't stay until 9:00 a.m. They told him this is the way they deemed most effective and they didn't see the problem in an ocassional backup. I sure hope they don't do this again and cause this traffic. This is going to be a major problem once school starts and there are more cars on the road.